Brian Byro, America's Breakthrough Speaker, shares six controllables that drive personal breakthroughs: a compelling why, 100% effort as your definition of success, releasing energy vampires, and shifting focus from obstacles to vision. He references Cliff Young's ultra-marathon win and John Wooden's philosophy to show how presence and commitment reshape what's possible.
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All right. Well, hello everybody and welcome to Fearless. This is our 28th episode and we have Brian Byro, America's Breakthrough Speaker, back for the 3rd time. Now that, that's a breakthrough, right? That is a breakthrough. Right there, because Brian's been on twice. We've had one other guest, Jim Cathcart, on twice, and Brian's busting through again. Because we have so much to talk about. It's just, you know, Brian and I were talking before the show just how aligned we are in terms of what we're trying to bring to the world in terms of breakthrough thinking and just get, you know, getting out of your own way, as I like to put it. So Fearless is a production by Fuel, and if you're not familiar with Fuel, I highly encourage you, and I know Brian will too, to check it out. It's myfuel.io. There he's got the shirt on. There we go. Yeah, I think he was wearing a Stanford shirt or sweatshirt the last time because Brian went to Stanford and went into coaching, swimming, swim coaching actually, and he can talk a little bit about that that just led him on his journey to what he's doing now. Brian's the author of six So I've got a couple of them right here. Beyond Success. We've got There Are No Overachievers, a classic legend of John Wooden. So he'll talk maybe a little bit about this. Lessons from the Legends. Fabulous books. Brian's actually the author of 16 books and has given over 2,000 keynotes worldwide. He's— to audiences upwards of 4,000 people. And he's ranked one of the top speakers in the country, if not the world. And I'll tell you something, he's just got so many nuggets. And I really want everybody to listen, not only to listen to this episode, but share it, subscribe and share it. We want to get the word out to the world about how do we break through limiting beliefs, these things weighing us down, these things holding us back, these A past. I did a recent show called Defining Moments. These defining moments in our life where we have an option to go one way or the other, positive or negative. Either you let it go if it's not something positive and you learn from it, meaning you turned it into a positive. So when you can turn negative experiences, what some call failures, into positive learnings or successes, It's game on. So check out myfuel.io. Brian and I both have courses, micro courses where you learn something very quickly and then you apply it. You apply it immediately. And then, and that's actually how you gain experience and wisdom in peak performance by doing.
Okay.
Now Brian quoted Confucius last on the last show. And it's what I hear, I forget. What I see, I remember, and it's what I do, I understand. 451 BC, I believe that was quoted. I wasn't there at that time. But anyway, so I go to my field.
A really powerful point at the time. Yeah.
Yeah, it's all about adult learning theory, experiential learning. By doing, we, we actually learn and we actually begin to know what we're doing. rather than think we know what we're doing. Also with fuel, check out Brian's twin, if I can call it that, his Brian AI, or some call it a bot or a twin or an avatar, different things. But here's what it is. It's Brian's body of work, over 30 years of work, loaded into an AI bot, if I can say that.
Mm-hmm.
With perfect recall, with the ability to speak over a dozen languages 24/7. So essentially what you're getting is Brian 24/7 worldwide in different languages. So if he's delivering a keynote and you have a follow-up question, you have something you wanted to ask him about, you see him on this podcast and you say, you know, he was talking about these 6 controllables, you know, these 6 Breakthrough Beliefs. I got a question about number 3 or number 2 or whatever. And there you go. I have an AI twin as well. So you can, you know, you can just have a conversation with either one of us and get, by the way, we're not going to the internet. Our bots aren't going to the internet to give you an answer. You're getting the answer from us. And if we don't, if it's outside of our scope of work, we don't fake it. Okay, so it's perfectly honest. It's perfect recall. It's awesome. You got to check it out. In fact, I was talking to Brian's chatbot yesterday, his AI twin, and, you know, it was spot on. It was because I've talked to Brian a number of times now, and it's just like, you know, that's pretty good, Brian. So last episode, we really talked about breakthrough belief number 1, and that when your why is compelling enough, You will figure out the how. You know, you'll figure out the how. But if you wait until you know how, you could, you could end up waiting an awful long time. And the how is ever-changing with the changes in technology. You know, 38 years ago when I started my practice, I didn't know how exactly I was going to do everything. And I certainly didn't know how I'd be here today on a podcast. There was no such thing as a podcast back then. You know, maybe you get on a radio or TV interview. There was no Google, no internet, no YouTube. The hows just keep showing up. So, but you got to take action. Brian is going to talk about that. So, Brian, maybe just a quick review of energy and focus and how important that is and being present. You talked about that last time and then that breakthrough number 1 and then let's get to breakthrough 2, 3 as far as we can get in this episode.
Awesome. Well, we started by talking about really 3 controllables that really, and the key is if you want to have a great life, if you want to have impact on other people, if you want to live healthier and live with more joy, it really comes down to focusing on controlling your controllables. Because it's only when we focus on what we don't control that we start to feel frustrated or angry or, or worried or stressed. And after 50 years of work, first as a coach, then as a business executive, and then 36 years as a speaker, my passion has always been trying to understand how do we break through? Because everyone, every single person watching this podcast has had breakthrough moments, moments when you shifted the trajectory of your life. Now, how do those happen? How can we make those plannable, not just possible? And that comes down to those 3 controls. So the first one we talked about was shaping your future, that every breakthrough starts with vision. You must see it before you can be it.
Right.
And the essential ingredient, the essential principle says what you focus on is what you create. And that's whether you focus on the obstacle or the breakthrough. You know, I use the metaphor in my events, the real-life experience of breaking the boards. And 95% of the people who do not break the board on the first try is because they look at the board. Has nothing to do with their physical strength. Has nothing to do with their coordination. I had a young man once, I'll never forget him, John. He was, he was 6'4, 245 pounds. He was a bodybuilder. His biceps were bigger than my body. Wow. His name was Robert. How old was this? Was 32 years ago. It was Southwestern Bell Yellow Pages. People go, "What's a Yellow Page?" So I'm holding this board for this young man whose biceps are huge, and he was terrified. And and I'm thinking maybe he's afraid he's going to break me. All right. I held the board. He hit the board so hard that parts of me jiggled that I didn't even know I had. And the board did not break. And the person right before him had been a young woman who was maybe 5 feet tall, maybe 100 pounds, who had flown through that board like it was paper. And I simply looked at him. I said, Robert, what did you look at? And he goes, I looked at the board. I said, all I want you to do this time is look in my eyes beyond the board, look for the breakthrough, not the obstacle, and straighten your arm out. He could have broken 5 boards from my martial arts training. I mean, he went through it like it was not there. But here's the power. Afterward, this was a small group in those days, and we kind of integrated what we had learned. And he got up in front of his peers— talk about courage— and said, I was terrified of this. And I knew because he was shaking. And everybody had the same exact moment of, what? They kind of thought, why? You're so strong. You're so big. And he said, I wasn't afraid of hurting myself. I was afraid of being the bodybuilder who couldn't break his board.
I love that.
I was afraid of being embarrassed. And so he taught us all that breakthroughs— everyone needs breakthroughs. Everyone has places in our lives where we want to get beyond that obstacle. And the starting place is to shift your vision, just as he did, beyond the obstacle to what you want. So really condition your mind that as you— you don't pretend there's no obstacles. There are obstacles. But get off the obstacle Once you see where it is, what is that challenge? And then how am I going to find my way beyond it? That's the starting place. The second of the controllables is to energize and engage your team. And John, you know as well as I am, as I do, you can't energize and engage your team until you energize and engage who?
Engage yourself.
Yeah, it starts on the inside, moves to the outside. And so what I wanted to really bring to people's awareness, most people think about their energy. In the same way they think about the weather. They think, man, I hope it cools off. I hope the weather is nice for that beach trip we're taking. Hope the winter is not so— we think it's like the weather, but your energy is nothing like the weather. Your energy is absolutely, positively, magnificently a matter of your choice. And when you understand that your energy is a choice and then how to cultivate a consistently better choice, Watch out. Because why is your energy so crucial? Well, because to everyone you touch, your energy is your example. People won't remember that much of what we say on this podcast, but they'll remember our energy. They'll remember the passion that we have. And it doesn't have to be wild and crazy. I'm a little wild and crazy. You're more introspective. And but people feel that passion energy to help people. So to everyone we touch, our energy is our example. And 2 simple, really 3 powerful ways to elevate energy by choice instead of chance. The first is to change the way you move. It's the fastest, the simplest way to change your energy. I'll give you an example. It's impossible to be down when you look up. If you look up and grin, you feel like you're about to lose it, you're, you know, really get emotional, look up and grin, you can't do it. We're not wired that way. So, if you slightly increase your movement, It magnificently elevates your energy. I joke about it, John, but it's the simple truth. When I am on stage, I am 25 years old. Almost 72, but on stage I'm 25 because I'm moving. I mean, I laugh because I don't do it intentionally, but I've really conditioned myself to really elevate movement. You know, and that has to do with your breathing, your facial expression, your eye position, Your actual physical movement, all of those elements, just elevating those will start to elevate your energy. On a 10-point energy scale with 1 comatose and 10 a child on Christmas morning, here's the most important question you could ever ask about your energy. Where are you living your life on that 10-point scale? And unless it's high enough, it's really holding you back. So if I ask that question, where am I living on that 10-point energy scale? And my answer was 6.5, What is that 6.5? It is nothing more than your eHabit. It is nothing more than your eComfort Zone. And until it gets high enough, it is your eConfinement Zone. So, the first way to elevate energy by choice instead of chance is to elevate your physical movement. Now, if you do that over a month, for about 2 weeks, it will feel really weird. And everybody who knows you will say, why are you so weird? But if you do it for 2 weeks, you will start to shift and it will feel weird to go back. Do it for 3 weeks, It'll feel very weird to go back. You do it for a month, you've changed your comfort zone, you've changed your habit, you'll never go back. John, the first time I ran a marathon, I, I, I— when I first started running, it was August of 1983. I ran 4 minutes and I thought I was gonna die. I mean, my lungs were bursting. I thought I was sweating like a horse. I mean, I was, I was— I didn't think I could even make it back to my, you know, to make it to a seat. But here's what I did. I applied movement. I added 1 minute more running the out direction, which made me have to run 1 minute more back in. So essentially, I was running 2 more minutes each day. In a month, I was running an hour. In 2 months, I was running 2 hours. Eventually, I was able to go in 6 months and run a 3-hour, 9-minute marathon from 4 minutes of dying. That's the power of movement.
Yeah.
Second key, and the biggest key of all to energy, is purpose. Whenever you're full of purpose, you're full of energy. Everyone watching your show, because it's the perfect book for it, is called Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl. And this was a man who endured the worst inhumanity to man in the concentration camp of Auschwitz in World War II. The day he was put in, he was separated from his wife and never saw her again. And he said something that has profoundly stuck with me. And that was when asked who made it, who were the people who made it through this starvation, this intense beating. And he said, it wasn't about your physicality. It was about a purpose left undone.
Yes.
If you had a child you had to get back to, if you had work you really were passionate to do and felt you must do, That was life. So, if you are not inspired, well, you are on the way to getting expired.
All right.
So, purpose. The 3rd we talked a bit about is releasing those energy vampires. You know, we all have people in our lives who, when we get up, they bring us down. We say yes, they say no, but they have no power over you until you give them that power. All right. And just recognize that when you say, no more, I am not going to let that hold me back. You are going to be in a position to release that energy vampire and it'll elevate your life. The third of the 3 controls— so the second is to energize and engage your team. The third is to build people, teams, and relationships. Every person on this podcast, every person you see on your left and your right every day is in the people business. It's how we grow and help others grow that determine how far we can go. And as we talked about last time, the foundation of it all is to be fully present. Because that's the only way we build trust at an unfakeable level. Because every time we're fully present, it's your greatest gift, John. Your greatest gift is that you're fully present. You listen, you look, you listen more with your ears, you listen with your heart and with your eyes. And that says to everyone who's been on your show and everyone who's been lucky enough to work with you, it tells them without words, you are important. It says to them, I'm important, I matter, I count. This man is interested in me. And you can't fake that. It only comes by making the commitment to be fully present. All right? So, those were the 3 foundational controllables and then we jumped into beliefs and the first one ties into that, what we just talked about, Man's Search for Meaning. Most people, when they are not getting the results they want, think it is all about strategy. Now, strategy can be vital, can be fantastic, can make great changes, but it is not as powerful as your purpose. When my children shook me up and taught me that, but when they said one night when I could have been tucking them in and loving them, being present with them, and instead I was reaching for my phone, and they said, Daddy, do you love your phone more than you love us? They gave me a compelling purpose. I knew what to do, but I didn't do what I know until my purpose was strong enough. And then my purpose was so strong That has never wavered since. That's my biggest goal in life is to be fully present. So that's our review up to where we got to.
Yeah. You know, I think you talk about your energy and you're up there, you feel like a 25-year-old. I think, well, part of that is the energy of the crowd. You know, it's the collective energy. And you've certainly talked about that where you got 10 people in a circle with, you know, one of them's breaking the board. It's not just their energy. It's the collective energy, right? It's the team. It truly is. You see it, you know, you see it in sports all the time. And I always like to think of it as like an orchestra. Everybody's got their instrument. Everybody's got talent and skill. But the beauty of a true orchestra is the oneness, if you will. It's pulling together. And you talk about leadership. To me, leadership in a nutshell is pulling people together, not separating.
Absolutely.
You've talked about from ego to we-go. That's essentially what we're talking about here. And from fear to love, I mean, that's transformational, right? So, and if your purpose is powerful enough, and I think you and I both, it's driven our entire careers. It's just like, I didn't know how I was going to do just about everything I've done. I don't know. You figure it out along the way, right? So that's, I mean, that's breakthrough number 1 is just start. And in terms of being present, it's the only time that ever is. And the NIH, the National Institutes of Health, came out with a study where it said we have about 60,000 thoughts per day and 80% are negative. So just stop and process that for a minute. And this is to our audience. That's a lot of thoughts. It's a lot of thinking. And if they're negative, we're just drawing more negativity into our lives. So Be mindful of your thoughts in the now. This is being present, as Brian's talking about. Be present, be mindful of your thoughts. And if they aren't positive and your vision isn't positive and you're thinking about something in the past that's, that's still bothering you, it could be from 10 years ago, or you're thinking about, you know, some, you know, somebody or something that just annoys you and you can't, and you haven't let that go. That's not being mindful of your thinking. That's letting your thinking mess with you. So, let's get to the next breakthrough, Brian.
So, the first belief is when your why is compelling enough, you'll figure out how. And that's where it all starts because if you think about anybody that you admired in your life, I guarantee you one thing. It could be all shapes, sizes, careers, you know, doesn't matter the religious belief, doesn't matter the political belief. If there's somebody you admire, you know that they are driven by purpose, that they live, they're living their purpose. There's not a day that goes by that I don't say, I love what I do. I mean, and it's my purpose. I feel that everything I do, I do in the direction of purpose. The second key breakthrough belief is really one that my mentor, John Wooden, who's up on my wall right there, the greatest coach of all time and and an even better person really lived by, and that's that success means giving 100%, that it's impossible to fail so long as you give your best. Now, that sounds really nice, but most people don't live that way. Most people focus that success is about results. Now, do we want results? Absolutely. Did John Wooden want to win? Absolutely. But he never said the words winning or losing to his players because to him, that wasn't success. Success to him was, success means giving your very best. In other words, success is about controlling your controllables and doing the best you can in those areas we talked about before. Now, when you live with that definition of success, you do a couple of really vital things. Number one, you stop comparing yourself to define who you are. Comparison is an absolute, an absolute epidemically difficult thing to bring into your life. When you compare yourself, you either blow up your ego or you deflate yourself. And it doesn't— you don't need to do that. Focus on your own self and focus on your own effort and energy and attitude. So as I said, Coach Wooden never said the words winning or losing to his players. And what was the result of that? 10 national championships, because he focused his players on what they put in every day. And that's what he rewarded. So, in my events, I ask people, you go, bam, it doesn't break. Bam, the board doesn't break. Bam, it doesn't break. Did you succeed or did you fail? And I said, the minute you stepped up and you went for it, you succeeded. You broke, you created a breakthrough. You put yourself in a new position. That's what you control, not whether the board breaks. And if you do that enough, good things will happen. So, shifting your definition of success to focusing on what you put in to get to the results rather than only defining it by the results or your comparison to others, It's an incredibly powerful breakthrough belief. The 3rd one is probably my favorite. And I put it in the context of the board breaking. It's what you just talked about, about the room full of people and that collective energy. And that is that the whole team breaks through every board. In other words, we are important to one another. Never once have I done board breaking, John, when somebody at the end didn't come up to me and say something like, Brian, I didn't think I could do it. But everybody was cheering for me so loud, it felt like they lifted me through my board. So what does that mean? That means that every— everyone around us, all right, is important to us and we're important to them. The whole— we never break through alone. Whenever we become kinder, it doesn't stop with us. It starts with us. Whenever we become a little more courageous and we, we jump out and we write that book, even though we don't have a clue what you do with it after you wrote the book. I remember I wrote my first book. I was trying to go, I got a book. What do I do with this thing now? All right. But the first step is to get out there and understand that the whole, the whole team breaks through with you. At every event at which I speak, I bring a photo of my family. As I've said before, they're my purpose. But what that does is it makes me expand beyond myself. And the best thing about human beings is we'll do more for others than we'll do for ourselves. And so when we realize that, we understand that what we do goes much further. My favorite movie of all time is It's a Wonderful Life. It's the, you know, classic Christmas movie. I know every word. I sob every year. But the story of the real message of that movie is the whole team breaks through every single board. We have no idea how one action we take, how far that ripple effect can go, but know that it does go. All right. So that's the 3rd breakthrough belief. The 4th and the 5th kind of go together. And they say, the 4th belief says, the past does not equal the future and competency happens in a moment. I love to tell a story. I hope we have time. A story of a guy named Cliff Young. Maybe you've heard this story. So I've ran a marathon. I have a lot of respect for marathons, 26 miles. Well, they run ultras all over the world. But the biggest ultra is 1,000 kilometers, so 600 miles, run in Australia from Sydney to Melbourne. It's called the King. All right, and 600 miles. So, um, kind of describe for me a man who can run, or a woman who can run, 600 miles. You know, they have like -2% body fat, they're probably 25 years old, you know, very lean. And, and that's the way it always was until one year this guy shows up who no one has ever seen at these races. It's very small group that runs these races. this very elite ultramarathon. And this guy looks a little older and he's not dressed right. He's not— he doesn't have the good-looking shorts on. He doesn't have the cool shoes, baggy shorts on, heavier shoes. And he looks a little older. And so they go up and they go, well, who are you and what are you doing here? And he goes, well, my name is Cliff Young and I came to run the race. They go, well, Cliff, we've never seen you before. What's your racing experience? And he goes, well, to tell you the truth, I've never run a race before in my life. And they're going, "Uh oh, we got a loser." All right, and then they say, "What makes you think you can run 600 miles?" And Cliff says, "Well, my whole life I've lived on a sheep station, and I never had a horse. So my whole life I've been chasing sheep. I figured, why hey, why not give it a go for the prize money?" So they go, "Well, he's a loser." Then he starts to warm up, and he doesn't run like anyone else. He doesn't have the clue, you know, the beautiful stride and style. He runs kind of like he's just kind of shuffling his feet. They're going, he's not going to make it 6 miles, much less 600. Now, the past said the only way you can run 600 miles, run over many days consecutively, is to run no more than 14 to 16 hours within each 24-hour period. That if you didn't rest and recover anywhere from 8 to 10 hours, you wouldn't make it. But nobody ever told Cliff, and nobody ever told the sheep. So if Cliff was out there chasing sheep and he decided to rest for 4 hours, they were gone. So make a long story short, the first 24 hours, Cliff never stopped shuffling. He just shuffled 24 hours. He ran 19 hours after that, after a 3-hour break, ran 19 hours. Not only did Cliff Young win the race that year, he broke the world record at the time by a day and a half. Now, that's not the best part of the story. The best part was, all right, guess what happened the next year? 4 people broke his world record, a record that, keep in mind, before he went that time, they would have said it was impossible. How did they do it? They shuffled just like him. Turned out that funny-looking running stride, the best way to run such an ultra distance. All right, what Cliff taught us is— and incidentally, for anybody who thinks they have limits in their life, you know how old Cliff Young was when he broke that world record? He was 61 years old.
Wow.
The past does not equal the future. Cliff taught us that the past was just the past. All right. And competency happens in a moment because the moment he ran that time, suddenly he shifted the possibility in other people's minds, just as Roger Bannister did when he broke the 4-minute mile. So the past does not equal the future. Competency happens in a moment. All right. Number 6.
You know what, Brian, I got to, I got to say one of the best parts of that story Was you speaking Australian.
It was my boss. Good on you, mate. That's about all I got.
Yeah. Beautiful.
All right. Number 6, there's always a way when you're committed. That is a huge belief. There's a difference between being interested and being committed. When you're committed, you're all in. Coach Wooden said the difference between being good and great is the difference between being willing And being eager. Commitment is eagerness.
I'm—
I can't wait. I've got— I'm going for this. I'm all in. Not 99.999, all in. And you know, that young man we talked about on the last show who was paraplegic, who had not moved his right arm, he was committed. That's how he broke through a board when everyone there thought maybe it's not possible. So ask yourself, are you committed or just interested? When you shift beyond that level of interest into true commitment, you'll find a way. You know, in 36 years of speaking, I've never missed an event, knock on wood. I've had to drive all night 3 times. Luckily, it was a place I could get to by driving all night. But that's because of commitment, not interest. I, I feel committed to give everything I can to my, to my teams. So I don't know where we're running. Are we running out of time or can we get to the last, the last one?
Yeah, we got Yeah, let's go to the last one, Brian. We got a couple more.
We got a few last ones. It says, focus on what you want, not what you don't want. Now, we talked a little bit about it, but let me put it in another context. When I have people break boards, it's a big deal. I mean, if you were in a martial arts program, you'd spend months before you do it. We do it in half an hour. How? Because we've learned the principles we've all talked about, but it is a big deal. However, you do not have to be a martial arts master to break your board. But at the moment you go to break through the WOO, the window of opportunity, you must focus on what you want and not on what you don't want. Like my, like Robert that I told you about, the big muscle guy. At the moment you go to break through, you must focus on your board holder's eyes because your holder's eyes are beyond the board. What you don't want to focus on is called the board. If the moment you focus on what you don't want, called the board, do you know what you'll get then?
The board.
You'll get what we call in the training world, a learning experience. You go, son of a gun, that's a piece of wood. However, if you hold your vision, you'll astonish yourself at what's really possible. So then ask yourself in your life, are you focusing on the board or are you focusing on the breakthrough? And the last, the last belief is really an action. Celebrate. Celebrate your breakthroughs.
There you go.
Enjoy the moment. Enjoy when you've given your absolute best. I remember one time, John, I was running in Santa Monica, California when I was going to UCLA and I'd started running. And for about, I don't know, maybe 200 meters, I just put my— I was like that Rocky, the original Rocky train. I was running as hard as I could. I couldn't have gone any harder. And I burst into tears because it was such a celebration to me to give everything I had. And I treasure that moment of being so completely immersed that it elevated my whole life. I mean, I'll remember that moment for the rest of my life. Nobody was there. I was, you know, there was no reason for it. I just did it and I celebrated the moment and that celebration stays with me all through my life that every time I give my best, what more do I have? Celebrate those moments when you give your best.
Oh, absolutely. And, you know, in terms of energy and frequency, celebration, gratitude, joy, you know, unconditional love. You know, we have talked about the Map of Consciousness, Dr. David Hawkins' brilliant work, and those high frequency energies draw more of the same. So the more love we give to the world, the more love we experience, and the more love we have to give. The more— it's counterintuitive. Wait a second, because the ego thinks, if I give it away, I don't have it. No. Truly spiritual, inspired living is about giving kindness to experience kindness, giving hope to experience hope.
Absolutely.
So we want to be mindful of those 60,000 thoughts a day to to be, what kind of thoughts am I thinking? Are they meopic? What's in it for me? Or are they weopic? What's in it for we? Those are terms I like to use.
Oh, I love that. And like you said, 48,000 of them are supposedly negative. What if we switch that over? What if 48,000 of them were towards what we want? We're positive, you know? And I love to put what you just said into a simple sentence that says, whenever we seek to enrich another's experience, we can't help but enrich our own because we have to put ourselves into that position to where we can serve others. You know, Mother Teresa said, service is love in action.
And, uh, there you go.
And, you know, when we, when we live from that place and we love to serve, if you really step back, it feels good to help others feel good.
All right.
And it's not really so much what we do. It's the love we put into the doing. And when we do that, we also get it right back. And that's the other beautiful joy of celebration. Celebrating is allowing yourself to receive the joy of a breakthrough. And you'll never be abundant until you learn to receive.
Yeah, I've talked about this too. It's a breakthrough that I had to make a long time ago, but I grew up with a belief that I wasn't worthy. And when you feel deep in your heart and your experience that you are not worthy, you never, you have trouble receiving even a compliment. You just, well, you have trouble receiving wealth and prosperity because your subconscious mind is saying you don't deserve it or you are not good enough. Absolutely. But, you know, here is a metaphor I want to share that I think is so important to our listeners and it ties in with your control of your controllables. as well as the Breakthrough Beliefs. And it's the metaphor of going through a buffet line, like a cafeteria line. And there are all these options. You've got all kinds of choices, right? Now imagine the person who's going through that line going, well, I don't like that, and I don't want that, and I don't want any of that. And finally, the chef says, how about this? How about you tell me what you do want?
Okay.
And that, I love that metaphor. I heard that a long time ago because I see it everywhere I go. I see people going, I don't like that. I don't, you know, it could be the weather. I don't like that person over there, really annoys me. And they're just, they're looking for the negative.
Yeah.
You know, so that's that 60,000 thoughts where so many of them are, I don't want that or that. How about simplifying it? And you've talked about John Wooden really being a master at simplifying. And I teach simplify to corporations. Let's lean things out. Let's get rid of a bunch of waste and muda and get better flow through our value chain, our value stream. But it's a simplified— and I always say this, the real definition of genius is simplifying the complex.
I love that.
And most people are, yeah, most people are complicating the simple. So stop and think about that. So I think hopefully our audience has taken some notes. Whenever I listen to you, Brian, I get pages of notes and it's just beautiful, wonderful stuff. Here's one last message I'd like to leave everybody with. Sometimes people say, okay, well, when your purpose and your why is important enough, you'll figure out, you know, the how. But what if I don't know my purpose? How do I figure that out? And I try to make it real simple for people. I said, you've been blessed with gifts. You've been blessed with sacred gifts. Give them away. Figure out what they are. And if you just do a little reflection, a little meditation, maybe it's your voice and you can sing to the world and wow people with beautiful music. Maybe it could be your desire to help people and your compassion. So maybe working for a volunteer organization or a hospital, you're going into nursing, and it's where you just get up in the morning and you can't do it. Again, to go back to Viktor Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, if we have that compelling purpose when we get up every day, we feel younger, we move better, to use your point about movement. Life is Good. And, you know, if you get skinned up a little bit now and then, you dust yourself off and you, you just move along. But Brian, your stories are phenomenal. How about just a couple of closing words? And then I'm gonna again remind people, go to myfuel.io, interact with Brian's AI, look at his courses. We've got dozens of instructors who are Hall of Fame speakers, Bestselling authors, phenomenal people with great experience. You want to do yourself a favor? Tune into that. Get into that frequency. Get into that energy and your life will just expand in front of you and be amazing. Both Brian and I have been there, let's just say. So, we are walking the walk. Brian, closing comments?
I guess the last thing I would say is just kind of bouncing off what you said. Live life giving a KISS, which is Keep It Simple, Superstar. Keep It Simple, Superstar. That is such a powerful, simple way to really get the most out of life. And I guess the last thing I'd say is when you talk about, remember that if you are focusing on all those things you don't want, either way, what you focus on is what you create. So if you keep focusing on what you don't want, you create more of what you don't want. So shift to ask yourself, what do I want?
Yeah.
All right. And understand, last thing about— we talked a little bit about receiving, that you'll never be a giver until you learn to receive. Because what you take away when you receive poorly is other people's joy of giving. We all love the feeling of giving. And when you don't receive from people, you make them feel it hurts to give. So complete the circle of giving. Giving and receiving are part of the same circle. Receiving is giving the gift of the joy of giving.
All right.
And most of all, be fully present because the past is history, the future a mystery. The gift is now. That's why we call it the present.
That's exactly right. You know, the only time is the now. I call it the eternal now. It's always now. So pay attention to how you are feeling in the now and how you are feeling is a reflection of what you're thinking. So sometimes people say, well, I can't control my feelings. And Murphy says, Oh yes, you can. You control your feelings by what you're thinking. So maybe if anybody's struggling with that, write on a board negativity and bust through that. Okay?
That's right.
Because that's, that's gonna— that's game-changing. So Brian, I mean, we're gonna have to just break through one more time and get you back on this show. I have some excellent guests lined up. Just truly remarkable guests. Next week, an amazing story from a fellow fuel instructor, Chip Bell, on his experience in Vietnam and what he went through and what he— the decision he made will blow your mind. And I'll emphasize the word.
Chip is so much fun. He's got— you guys don't miss Chip Bell. He is— he's got that down-home fun way of putting things and one of the great customer service experts in the world too.
So, oh yeah, yeah. So we'll get Chip Bell on here, and then we've got, uh, the following week Peter Winnick. We've got some fantastic people coming up. So, uh, thank you for joining us on Fearless. I urge you to subscribe if you haven't, share and invite people to, uh, to, to listen to Brian, and, uh, and, and then check out his books. They're just— they're, they're legendary. I'll leave it at that. So we'll see you, uh, see you on the next episode. Brian, thank you so much.
You're just—
Thank you, John.
It's always just pure joy having the time with you. Thank you, my friend.
